BTG Pactual net profit rises 45% on year

JeffreyT. Lewis

SÃO PAULO--Embattled Brazilian investment bank Banco BTG Pactual said Tuesday its net profit in the fourth quarter jumped 45% from a year earlier as revenue from trading activities increased.

The company had net income of 1.2 billion reais ($296 million) in the quarter, according to the unaudited earnings figures the bank sent Brazil's financial markets regulator. BTG had total revenue of 3.5 billion reais in the fourth quarter, more than double the 1.6 billion reais of income in the same period of 2014. Net income fell in the fourth quarter from 1.5 billion reais in the third quarter of 2015.

Revenue from trading and sales increased to 2.3 billion reais in the fourth quarter of 2015 from 527 million reais a year earlier, the bank said. For the full year 2015, BTG's net income rose to 4.6 billion reais from 3.4 billion reais in 2014, and revenue rose to 10.1 billion reais from 6.7 billion reais.

The lender's former chief executive officer, André Esteves, was arrested at the end of November, 2015, on allegations he had interfered with a criminal investigation regarding corruption at state-controlled oil company Petróleo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras.

Mr. Esteves has denied any wrongdoing and was released from jail shortly before Christmas, though he remains under house arrest.

The company acknowledged that the arrest of its former CEO, who was replaced by co-CEOs Marcelo Kalim and Roberto Sallouti, has affected its business and the price of its traded units. Control of the bank was shifted from Mr. Esteves to a group of seven partners.

The bank has begun selling assets and taken other actions that have already "resulted in significant improvement in our liquidity and solvency ratios, with important reduction in our liabilities," the bank said in the note to the regulator.

As a result of those measures, on Jan. 15 the amount of cash and equivalents the bank had on hand was greater than it was the day before Mr. Esteves was arrested, and the lender's liquidity coverage ratio was at 112%, BTG said.

Intraday Data provided by SIX Financial Information and subject to terms of use.
Historical and current end-of-day data provided by SIX Financial Information. Intraday data
delayed per exchange requirements. S&P/Dow Jones Indices (SM) from Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
All quotes are in local exchange time. Real time last sale data provided by NASDAQ. More
information on NASDAQ traded symbols and their current financial status. Intraday
data delayed 15 minutes for Nasdaq, and 20 minutes for other exchanges. S&P/Dow Jones Indices (SM)
from Dow Jones & Company, Inc. SEHK intraday data is provided by SIX Financial Information and is
at least 60-minutes delayed. All quotes are in local exchange time.